Stay motivated

When you get your results in August you'll be looking at grades written down either online or on a piece of paper. If it's gone well people will be congratulating you. You'll feel good about it. There'll be excitement and relief. If you're paying attention to what you're reading here you'll notice something very important about what you've just read.

All you get is the feeling!

All you're going to get is a piece of paper and a whole bunch of feelings. All you ever get out of life is a feeling. Humans are motivated to go towards what they think will make them feel better and away from what they think will feel worse. It doesn't matter what it is; money, a big house, a car. You name it we are always going for the feeling that comes along with whatever it is we say we want.

How can you use this knowledge to help you stay motivated?

Set goals for your exams.

You can do what the kids on our courses do. You can set goals for your exam results. Here's how to do it. Take a sheet of paper and divide it into three columns. In the left hand column write down all the subjects you're entered to take exams in: Maths, English, French and so on. Next ask yourself a question. What if you turn up to school on time, pay attention in class, do your revision and hand in all of your coursework? What grade do you think you can get in each of your subjects if you do what you already know you can do now? Write those grades in the middle column.

In the right hand column write a grade for each subject that is one whole grade higher than what you wrote in the middle column. This is your grade goal. For example if the middle column says a B then your goal is A. If it's D then your grade goal is C. If you have A in the middle column then your goal is A*. Make sure it is a whole grade, no pluses or minuses, you won't get pluses and minuses on your exam results statement when it arrives in the Summer.

Imagine.

Imagine for a moment how good it will feel when you achieve your grade goals. Use your imagination and see yourself with those grades. You are opening your exam results in August and you've got exactly these grades.

Taking a few moments each day to imagine your future being the way you want it to be will help you stay motivated and help you to motivate yourself to work towards creating it. We want to be clear about it though, from where you are now you can't see how you'll be able to reach your goals. You're not expected to. That's the point. A goal is something you really want but don't know how to achieve. If you knew how to do it you'd already be doing it. You won't and you can't know exactly how you'll take every single step towards your goals, but you can take the next and the next and the next step after that until you get there.

Once you've set your goals, put your written goal grades on the wall where you'll see them. That's your next step. Downloading and then using the Audio Patch to help you relax and see yourself getting the grades you want is another step. Using the List & Persist Method to get organised is yet another. You can find out how do do all these things here on our site.